In case you have missed it, Disney Stores UK (and other Disney Stores EU) have unveiled the entire series of McQueen Country Flag Grand Prix racers.

These are 1:43 scale Disney Store Lightning McQueen’s.

One car will be released each week starting July 30th!

The packaging is kind of intriguing though at the end of the day, kind of difficult to store …

The website design is nice as you can click through to see each car in packaging and open – so that’s nice …

Why isn’t this series available in the US? Well, they are definitely not canon to the film but I also think a more critical reason is these are pretty weak design wise. If you contrast it with the Stars & Stripes Lightning McQueen from the Disney Stores US, you can clearly see the difference in design depth & quality.

The Disney Stores US clearly understands that the diecast is a blank canvas and you bring artistry to that “canvas.”

Contrast that with their Ireland design below. Colorizing the flame to the flag color is minimal work. Adding a shamrock – that’s going out on a limb and then a triangle painting of the Irish flag colors and the official flag added to a giant blank spot on the hood and sides. I understand you can’t mess too much of a flag but why is it designed for a tiny scale car and all that blank space?

Or if you look at their USA one – what’s the deal with the three stars? Isn’t that more like the flags of New Zealand and Australia?

Not surprisingly, the nicest ones are based on the Pixar character designs for the other racers. And the Portugal one actually looks decent enough but the bottom line is they don’t really evoke the country. It seems like some junior designer was given 3 hours to crank these out. They clearly spent more time on the logo and packaging which are intriguing and fun – the CARS themselves are pretty weak.

So, it’s a good thing they’re not available in the US – maybe Disney US is working on their own series – they are off to a good start with Stars & Stripes Lightning.